PROFESSOR “ASSAULTED”

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20329, 12 June 1934, Page 1

PROFESSOR “ASSAULTED”

Masked Student Snatch”' Mortar Board.

MELBOURNE, June 6.

Professor K. H. Bailey, Dean of the Faculty of Law, was “ assaulted ” by a masked student, who walked into his lecture room as he was finishing a lecture to-day, grabbed his mortar board and ran.

Professor Bailey and a new student started in pursuit, but the masked man made a quick getaway. Although not yet arrested, he will be tried for common assault at a meeting of the Law Students’ Society on June 20. The professor’s mortar- board was dropped at the door. Professor Bailey had been warned of the “ attaclc,” but no law students, except the organisers, knew of it. The class at the lecture believed that an attack had really been made until their names were taken as witnesses as they left the theatre.

Professor Bailey said to-day that the “ crime ” was to give students an opportunity of testing their own powers as witnesses, and their credibility as observers. Although the “ criminal ” was known to them, he was masked, had his hat down iver his eyes,« and a scarf wound round the part of his face. It was doubtful whether any of the class would be able satisfactorily to establish his identity.